


Always Known

by Tumblinginmyfeels



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Debatable Character Death, Gen, Ghosts, OC Character Death, Questionable Major Character Death, but don't worry he's fine, cults?, full disclaimer I was drunk when I posted this, shameless plug of my own theory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-16
Updated: 2019-03-16
Packaged: 2019-11-18 22:05:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18127082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tumblinginmyfeels/pseuds/Tumblinginmyfeels
Summary: "I'm not an idiot, Dipper! Of course this town is weird and the one thing I know about weirdness is that it's dangerous!"Aka, 5 times Stan hated anomalies and one time he thought it was all right.





	Always Known

**Author's Note:**

> Shameless plug of my "Stan knew about Bill" theory
> 
> https://thearchivist-theprime.tumblr.com/post/148253402782/i-know-lots-of-things
> 
> https://thearchivist-theprime.tumblr.com/post/183484763502/im-revisiting-my-i-know-lots-of-things-theory

1.

The first time it happened was in Alabama. 

 

Steve Forest, which was absolutely his actual name, was driving down a country road in the middle of nowhere. He would be using this time to come up with his latest money-making scheme if it wasn’t for the dark, winding roads. 

 

The trees rustled in the light wind. Clouds obscured the moon. It was silent inside the car. The stretch of the road revealed nothing to Steve.

 

Something felt wrong. Normally he’d just chalk it up to paranoia, but he hasn’t consumed anything in the last 12 hours and he wasn’t worried about some pissed off customers. 

 

He tried again to turn on his car’s radio, but only got static once again. He growled and hit the damn thing. At this rate, he was going to roll his windows down just to have some background noise. 

 

Everything outside of his headlights felt almost consumed by the inky darkness of the Alabama night. Steve tightly gripped the steering wheel and tried to focus on the wind and the distant noises of animals. He stared down the road in an attempt to ignore his discomfort. 

 

It was because he was paying such close attention to the road to saw it.

 

A spot of either red or pink. 

 

Steve recoiled a bit in his seat. His immediate thought was it was blood, but as he drove past and it fluttered away he figured it was a flower petal. After that, he thought nothing else of it even when he saw more and more petals all over the road. He vaguely wondered why someone threw a flower bouquet out a car window in the middle of nowhere. 

 

A huge gust of wind suddenly ripped through the air. And kept going on. He swore at the sudden...what? Windstorm?

 

The flower petals were hitting and sticking to his car now. They looked..distinctly wet. Like as if someone ate a rose or something. 

 

Between the leaves, roaring wind, and rose petals he almost didn’t see the crashed car. 

 

But he did, and he almost drove past until he saw some... _ creatures _ ...carrying a little girl. Steve wouldn’t consider himself a good person and he  _ definitely _ wasn’t a law-abiding citizen, but he was pretty sure ignoring a child abduction would firmly land him in “being a monster” territory. He slammed down on his breaks. 

 

Steve scrambled out of his car, armed with his Stanco. baseball bat and calculating how many hits he could get in before the damn thing fell apart, and assessed the scene.

 

Crashed car: exactly what it looked like. A middle-aged man with unfortunate facial hair: dead and had a flower petal sticking to his chin with dried saliva. Little girl with suspicious bruises on her face clinging to her abductors: had a calm, peaceful look on her face.  

 

The creatures were some ugly-ass motherfuckers. They were vaguely humanoid but green with twisted features and thin bodies. They had dragonfly-like wings on their backs.

 

Steve’s hands were trembling, and the only reason he wasn’t flipping the fuck out was because of Ford’s rambling discussions over anomalies and whatever from when they were kids. 

 

“ _ Leave _ .” They said. 

 

“Not until you give me the girl!” He said, adjusting his stance and raising his bat defensively. The girl began to shriek at him to leave her alone, that she needed to go, about timelines and other science mumbo jumbo that _ Ford _ would’ve understood, and that she wanted to go. She tightly clung to the creature. 

 

One of the creatures that weren’t holding the girl flew right at him. A powerful gust of wind suddenly pushed against him and it gave the monster enough of an opening to push him the ground by his throat. 

 

“Fuck!” Steve loudly swore as he tried to blink away the pain and wetness at the back of his head and a hand tightly clutching his throat. It wasn’t enough to choke him, but Steve was not going to risk it. He thrashed around to no avail. It leaned down close to his face. 

 

“ _ This has nothing to do with you. Leave _ !”

 

The hand didn’t get any tighter, but Steve felt the pressure in his throat tighten. 

 

The creatures by the car started walking away and started getting brighter. The hand let go and he immediately threw himself onto his stomach and frantically coughing. The goblin lookalikes transformed into tiny, brightly glowing  _ things _ , ‘fairy’ tickled the back of his subconscious but it was promptly shut down, and along with the girl they disappeared. 

 

Steve continued to hack until he coughed up rose petals. His throat cleared and he stared at the wet, brightly-colored clumps spat out in front of him. After a long moment, he wiped his face, stood up on trembling legs, and walked back to his car. He poked at the back of his head to assess the damage. He then rubbed his throat and was half worried there were more petals there.

 

He ignored the blood and the pain and the petals and the clawing guilt inside his chest.

 

He stepped into his car and drove away. 

 

2.

 

Mexico, and what follows after, obviously was not a fun time in Shane Pineston’s life. 

 

Colombia nights were the worst. Shane was half asleep, hands folded over his chest, breathing deeply, and listening carefully for anyone who thought he was an easy target. 

 

He may not easily learn languages, but he can understand when someone says they’re hoping he’d die. 

 

Shane heard a skittering noise and didn’t think anything of it. That was his first mistake. The noise continued, but he figured it was a huge spider or something. 

 

He felt pressure on his chest. He snapped his eyes open.

 

Some kind of creature was staring, wide-eyed, into his face. It was a glowing, bright blue color, had thin limbs attached to a disproportional bulbous body. It was grinning widely with thin, sharp teeth and had reflective eyes. It was applying some pressure on his chest, but not enough for this thing’s size. 

 

Shane saw his own fearful expression in its eyes and then…

 

Ford’s nerd machine. The one he broke. Then he saw all the moments he’s been overthinking these past few years. Anytime he overthinks about how he “rode off his brother’s coattails” or any hint that the Stan O War wasn’t his dream anymore. He found himself frozen by the creature’s stare and by fear. 

 

The images kept going and he felt a strangled noise build in his throat. 

 

He screamed. 

 

Shane’s prison mates jerked awake and started shouting curses at him. The creature hissed and skittered onto the wall. 

 

“ ¡Espíritu! ¡Espíritu!” Shane shouted pointing at the said spirit.

 

“¡No hay nadie allí idiota!” Rico grounded out.

 

The spirit grinned and crawled away. After a second it disappeared. 

 

Shane laid back down on his bed and didn’t sleep a wink. 

  
  


3.

The town was unsettlingly quiet. 

 

Sal Pinel drove down the street, the hush putting him on edge.

 

It was an itty bitty small town in Arizona, population less than 500 people. 

 

He cautiously drove up to a gas station, he pulled up to a pump, and exited the car.

 

Everyone stared.

 

Oh god, this was a terrible idea.

 

He wished he had a hoodie or hat or anything to help him hide because he knew people staring got him in trouble. People remember you easier. And it was plain uncomfortable.

 

He quickly walked to the register (he was too broke to buy food anyway) and slammed down the cash much harsher than necessary.

 

“Hey, Stranger, where’ve you been?”

 

Sal startled at the question, why the hell would he like to know? Not just him, everyone in the building was staring, and eager to hear his answer.

 

“Why?” he snapped harshly. 

 

The cashier shrugged.

 

“Not important. What’s important is how the hell did you end up here?”

 

The burly man glared. “I grew wings and flew...I drove dumbass.”

 

Rather than be offended at the insult he shrugged again.

 

Sal sharply turned around and almost ran out when the man’s voice spoke again.

 

“Motel is a mile from here. Sleep well. You’re going to need it.”

 

Like hell. He was going to get out of here.

 

Sal Pinel booked out of the little gas station as fast as possible, and not even caring about keeping up the facade that he wasn’t freaked out. 

 

Just before he closed his car door everything went black.

 

* * *

 

 

He woke up with a burlap sack over his head and his feet dragging on the floor as he was carried somewhere.

 

Oh fuck, oh fuck no, no no no no, fuck no…

 

This was just a recipe for disaster. 

 

“Ten bucks her majesty will say no.” a voice said. 

 

“I dunno, who never know.” another voice argued and sounded somewhat annoyed.

 

‘Calm down idiot! Figure out the situation.’ an inner voice yelled at him. It sounded like Ford. “Don’t think about him!’ it snapped. 

 

He paid attention to the surface his feet here being dragged over, sand and rocks. The air felt dry and cold. Okay, he was in the desert, and the first voice mentioned a ‘her majesty’. Is this some cultish bullshit?!

 

Never trust small towns. Sal was starting to think they were all in another plane of existence. 

 

Sal then heard the rushing of water, a river?

 

“I know you’re awake.” the first voice said. “Better wake up, we’re almost there and it’s almost sunrise. And when we arrive…” A long pause “Well we all find out how much we’re worth after.”

 

Sal started fighting their grip. He really didn’t want to hear that information. The people grunted but their grip remained firm. 

 

“Here’s some advice, kid: just follow what you know, just put faith in her decision, don’t fight her flow, and most importantly. Trust her decision.” A second voice said.

 

Sal started squirming harder. He felt the first rays of the sun on his face.

 

“It’s not so bad here. We have a community here. Family. We all went through this and she decided we were all worthy. If she decides you are too, you could be happy here.” The first voice softly admitted.

 

Sal was about the turn to them and curse them out when he felt someone tear the bag off and all the hands push him. He only saw a few seconds of sunlight before he hit the water.

 

The sky turned black, the people were gone, and the calm river of before turned rough. The waves crashed into him and the shore, and it threatened to bury him in its mighty waves.

 

Sal tried to keep his head above the water. Years of swimming were for naught as he flailed his arms around to try and fight the waves. 

 

Someone was watching him. 

 

_ Well well well. Who do we have here? _

 

Stan yelped at the sudden, foreign words and a slight pressure in his head. Well, not  _ words _ per se, but expressed emotions that his brain could only translate into words. She sounded perfectly dignified despite the raging river.

 

_ I am _ _ the river. Hmmm, Stanley Pines? But you do not go by that anymore, do you? _

 

‘Get out of my head!’ Sal shouted inside his head.

 

_ Well, that’s not very nice. _

 

‘Fuck you!’

 

The...river…? The river tutted. 

 

He felt the pressure in his head build and the only thing keeping him from curling into a ball is the need to keep swimming against the river.

 

_ This would go easier if you did not fight me.  _

 

‘Like hell!’

 

The pressure built until he couldn’t do anything besides curl up and clutch his head. He slowly sunk.

 

_ Shhhh. Do not worry. You will not die.  _

 

And just like that, she was shuffling through his head, shuffling through his memories. Sal tried to force her out, but she just tutted again.

 

_ It would be easier if you helped me. Follow my lead and this will be done faster. _

 

Which he was unwilling to do. He already knew what was there, what he did wrong. All the ways he was unworthy. And besides, there was a lot of stuff he didn’t remember anyway. The ’70s was a rough time.

 

He sank and sank and sank until the river seemed to get what she wanted. 

 

_ You must keep going. _

 

The water stilled and the pressure dissipated. Sal frantically swam up. Right as he was about to reach the top she ‘spoke’ again.

 

_ Goodbye Stanley.  _

 

He felt like there was more she wanted to ‘say’ but he couldn’t care less. He reached the crest of the water and found…sunshine. A calm river. A wide, cloudless sky. He quickly swam to the shore. As soon as he heaved himself onto dry land, after giving the water a petty kick, he saw his car.

 

Sal stumbled towards it and wasted no time trying to get as far away from the town as he could. 

 

4.

 

Liam Pike was lost. 

 

He cursed under his breath and he continued to drive. If he doesn’t get gas soon he’s going to be stranded in the middle of nowhere. 

 

Deep frustration bubbled to the surface. His face twisted into a furious expression. 

 

“I’m fucking  _ lost _ !” he growled out to no one as he hit his steering wheel. 

 

Suddenly, a sign appeared in the distance. 

 

Liam drove for a long moment and right before he passed it he was able to read it.

 

Well...that’s a weird name for a town. He was immediately put on edge since the last time he’s been a desert town was that river cult town…

 

He finally entered the decrepit city lines and his first mistake was not turning around immediately.

 

People slowly shuffled around in gas masks, people in outrageously strange clothes and inhuman features, and a fearful silence in the air. 

 

Liam ignored bug-infested citizens, police people in outfits declaring them the ‘secret police’, and blood as he looked for a gas station. They all stopped when they saw his car and just  _ stared _ .

 

He finally found a gas station, pulled up, and shuffled around the car for loose change when he threw a handful of junk onto his passenger seat. A pen fell off the seat and settled back onto the car floor.

 

Liam heard the sound of running behind him, and the next thing he knew was darkness.

 

* * *

 

 

He came to chained up in a cave. The only thing he could hear is the gentle tone of the community radio host. Liam pulled against his chains until he was exhausted. 

 

After several days of complete solitude, he realized he was in pretty deep shit. He was so thirsty, and it was exceedingly clear this was not a normal prison. 

 

A few more days he died.

 

And woke up. 

 

Liam gasped as he felt like he was returning to his body. He curled up as much as he could at the moment and just trembled. 

 

The next time he died of starvation. The time after that was him dying after being beaten by invisible hands and feet. There was once he lived and lived and lived until the death of the universe and beyond. He floated in the vast completeness of the void for all eternity. He  _ felt  _ every second. Time went on and on and on and on and on without end and Liam felt nothing for millennia. There were a few times he escaped and lived a long, happy life. Or a short, miserable one. Or a long, miserable one. He woke up back here every single time.

 

He died alone every single time.

 

There was once he floated around ghost-like in the cave and watched his own body decay right in front of his eyes. There was another time he chewed his own hands off to escape and he died bloody and broken in just another corner of his makeshift prison. 

 

He hated the calming voice of the radio host. 

 

And, finally, there was a time where he was unchained and light streamed into his prison. Despite knowing it was still yet another lifetime he’d have to get through before he woke up, he shuffled through the exit as fast as he could.

 

He found his car in the condition he left it in town. It didn’t look broken into even, and barely felt any hotter in the scorching desert heat. He maneuvered himself into the car and caught a glimpse of himself in the rearview mirror. 

 

Liam Pike looked...emaciated. His skin was pasty and white, and he now had deeply sunken eyes. His hair was long. He looked at his hands to see his nails were long and some were broken off. 

 

His wrists had deep, blood-covered marks on them. 

 

He sharply pulled down his visor and scribbled out the entire state on his “States I’m Banned From” map. He swiftly put his car in drive and manically drove out of town. 

 

Liam didn’t stop until he was in the next state. And if he cried while he was driving, well, there was no one to see. 

 

5.

 

Stanford Pines was being watched. 

 

Normally, Stan would chalk this up to his stupid brain being stupid and too little sleep as he frantically tried to get Ford’s portal started again. 

 

Stan may be useless, a cheat, and stupid, but he was slowly piecing together there were more dangerous things about Gravity Falls than gnomes raiding his garbage.

 

He was being watched by the Illuminati symbol littered all over the house. There were times in the middle of the night he  _ swore _ the eye followed his movements. 

 

Eyes seemed to be an important aspect here, “I had to make sure you weren’t- nevermind” Ford had said after checking Stan’s eyes, had to make sure he  _ wasn’t _ who, and he obviously didn’t forgive Stan so whoever it was Ford had to be  _ truly desperate _ . He thought of all this as he frantically tried to revisit the what-ifs and where he went wrong. 

 

Ford’s books about the Mindscape were a good starting point (years later Soos forcing him to watch anime with him was even more so. “Soul Rooms” and altering them made more sense than his bro’s Big, Important Science Books)

 

So a triangle asshole that dealt with the Mindscape was likely Ford’s tormentor. And Stan was likely doing exactly what he wanted because he hasn’t appeared to him yet. 

 

But Stan thinks it knows about him knowing. The ‘being watched’ feeling increases over the next few years and reaches a zenith when he hears foreign laughter in his dreams. 

 

Exactly 2 years and 4 days after the real Stanford Pines fell through the portal, the triangle...left. No more laughter, no more watching. 

 

And for 30 years Stanford Pines pretended. He pretended to be Stanford, he pretends to not believe, to never see what was going or else those Blind Eye freaks will fuck everything up, he pretends to not know about the triangle and he throws himself into getting the stupid portal working.

 

He tries to change the windows but they always morph back into the triangle shape. He burns the rug with the triangle on it but it reappeared every time. He eventually dumps it into the Gift Shop. It knows what he’s doing anyway, so Stan hoped it got a good look up his boxers every night. 

 

Everything was fine. Until the goddamn kids arrived at his doorstep. In retrospect, Stan had no idea why he never thought Dipper found Ford’s stupid journal, but it made an obscene amount of sense. 

 

If that wasn’t enough he finally found out who the “Bill” was that Gideon, Mabel, and Dipper was talking about. The being watched feeling returned, and Bill seemed to go out of his way to taunt him as evidenced by actually calling him during his infomercials.

 

And...well...everyone knew who Bill was after the summer sky broke apart, so what he knew before was irrelevant.

 

+1.

 

It started with Mabel looking through Journal 3 on Stan’s armchair. She sniffled as she stared down a specific page.

 

When Ford noticed her and saw the page she was feeling guilty over he gently picked her up and sat on the chair and held her close in his lap.

 

“I laughed for a solid five minutes when I saw this Mabel.” He gently said, smiling when he looked at the drawing of Mabel in a paper hat and declaring that the Author needed to ‘up his game.’ “Will you talk to me about why you are really feeling guilty?”

 

She goes into an entire rant about why the Weirdmageddon, and Stan’s subsequent memory loss, was her fault. 

 

He waited until she was finished before explaining if it was anyone’s fault it was his own. He summoned Bill in the first place and he tried to take her brother away from her. 

 

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I-”

 

“Grunkle Ford.”

 

He snapped his mouth shut.

 

“Please don’t blame yourself. Bill tried to hurt you too, and I know you’ve been blaming yourself for a lot of things lately.” Mabel said, propping herself up and pressing herself more firmly against Ford’s chest.

 

“How about this? I won’t blame myself if you don’t blame yourself.” Ford declared wrapping his arms around her tighter.

 

“...Okay…” Mabel said softly. They sat together for a long moment before, “Can you tell me more about the Scampfires? They’re sooooooo cuteeeeee!” She asked. She almost sounded like herself. She scrambled off of him onto the skull beside the chair so he could reach for the fallen journal.

 

He was telling her about how he first discovered the creature and how he found various other ‘adorable’ anomalies. Sometime during his stories, Dipper appeared and leaned against the opposite armrest from his sister.

 

He moved on from the ‘cuter’ ones and just told stories about the creatures he found and why he wrote what he did. 

 

Ford heard Stan lean on the back of the chair. 

 

Normally Stan would balk at the idea of anything supernatural, as evidenced by his fear and shut-in behavior during Weirdmageddon, but Ford was not going to mention anything when he was surrounded by his family and they were  **_safe_ ** .

 

Stan grinned as he listened to his bro talking about these weird things he loved so much, and safe in the knowledge Bill was gone, he felt strangely safe talking about anomalies. 

 

His family was here, safe, and happy. Ford’s forgiven him.

 

At that moment, Stanley Pines decided that weirdness might not be half-bad. Maybe. Sometimes. In certain circumstances.

 

Whatever.  

 

They listened to Ford talks about his Journal for hours and by the time Ford stopped (not run out) it was sunset.

 

Who knows? Maybe Ford’s wonder for these things will rub off to him.

**Author's Note:**

> Infinite respect to those who guess which pieces of media inspired the creatures from 1-4.
> 
> Kudos to Keelan_666 for correctly guessing the show the first creatures are from!
> 
> Kudos to Holly for correctly guessing the podcast #4 is from!


End file.
